Pablo PICASSO (1881-1973). - Lot 39

Pablo PICASSO (1881-1973). SUENO Y MENTIRA DE FRANCO, 1937. In folio, Italian style, leaves, illustrated gray-tinted paper-covered hardback, in ivory hardback folder. Complete with eighteen emargé etchings, mounted on paper folders, two with studio stamps and two numbered 225/850. One of 850 copies on vergé, with proof 225/850 stamped, signed by the artist with autograph dispatch in blue grease pencil. Slightly foxed, worn slipcase. This series of etchings depicts the monstrous figure of Franco, in the aftermath of his coup d'état (1936) and at the height of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). A veritable anti-Franco satyr, the dictator appears as a grotesque, bloodthirsty knight, while in the background Picasso denounces the disasters of war, illustrating in particular the allegory of the Bull, symbol of the Spanish Republic. A precursor to "Guernica" (painted for the Spanish Republican Government Pavilion at the 1937 World's Fair), this suite is one of the artist's first political reactions, originally published as a supplement to the magazine "Cahiers d'Art" n°1-3, directed by ZERVOS. A sort of comic strip, the title "Franco's Dream and Lies" is borrowed from Calderón.